Maryland Lays Out AI Policy Agenda for Work, Schools and Likeness Rights

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore has set out statewide principles for addressing potential AI harms, putting residents’ rights, workers, children and public systems at the center of a policy agenda that could reach employers, schools and AI companies.

The announcement is not a finished regulatory code. It is a commitment to develop legislative recommendations for regulating AI companies, recognize personal likeness as a property right, and issue guidance on AI use in housing, lending and employment. Those areas put the state’s agenda directly alongside decisions that can affect a person’s job, finances or identity.

A wide remit for state action

Moore’s first principle is framed around protection from emerging AI threats to rights and safety, infrastructure, democracy, public services and the economy. The administration’s other two principles focus on workers having a voice and receiving training and transition support, and on protecting children from exploitation and harm.

The agenda’s main policy routes

• Legislative recommendations aimed at regulating AI companies, alongside guidance for housing, lending and employment uses.
• Recognition of a person’s likeness as property, an approach aimed at giving personal identity a defined place in the policy agenda.
• A standing labor-management committee to coordinate with unions, agencies and legislative committees on AI’s effect on state workers.
• School protocols for AI tools students use, plus work with other states on harmful or addictive AI-driven social-media engagement for users under 16.

Workers are part of the governing structure

The labor-management committee is a concrete part of the plan’s machinery. The Moore administration said it would work with the Department of Budget and Management, legislative committees and other state agencies to strengthen coordination with unions representing state workers on AI’s impact. That places worker input inside an ongoing state process rather than treating training and transition support as a stand-alone promise.

Schools and platforms face separate questions

For education, Maryland legislators will work with the state Department of Education on protocols for any AI tool a student encounters at school. The administration also said it would work with the attorney general, legislature and other states to prevent social-media platforms from using AI and algorithmic design features to drive addictive or harmful engagement among people under 16.

The school and social-media pieces point to two different policy mechanisms: setting rules for tools used in public education, and pursuing coordination across government boundaries where platform design is concerned. The announcement identifies those directions, but the stated next steps are protocols, coordination and legislative recommendations rather than detailed requirements already in force.

An extension of Maryland’s existing framework

Moore said the agenda builds on Maryland’s 2024 executive order, the Artificial Intelligence Governance Act of 2024 and the state’s Responsible AI Policy. The new principles therefore extend an existing state foundation while opening a broader set of questions about how AI should be governed in daily public and economic life.